About the Lehigh Valley Folk Music Society

Purpose: The Lehigh Valley Folk Music Society (LVFMS) is a registered non-profit organization formed by local folk musicians in 1996 in the Allentown area to foster an appreciation of old-time folk music for people of all ages across the greater Lehigh Valley and surrounding communities within eastern Pennsylvania. On the third Wednesday of each month the Society sponsors an open-to-the-public jam session at the Lehigh County Senior Citizen Center. and our performing musicians meet weekly to develop both public and private performances of folk music. Our Society volunteers contribute their time and Society funds to assist other groups and organizations in the Lehigh Valley to promote appreciation of the arts. Our Society has produced three excellent CD compliations of traditional folk, gospel and original folk music which are made avaialable for sale to the public to help raise funds for the Society. The Society is currently a member of the Lehigh Valley Arts Council and through the Council we also sponsor an educational outreach program for school children. Over the past several years, our Society has been associated with the Allentown Mayfair Festival as a participating Art Partner conducting a children's program, performing folk music concerts and sponsoring jam sessions and folk music venues by invited musicians. The Society joined Bethlehem Musikfest as a folk music advisor where we have performed and sponsored concerts at Liederplatz and Kidsplats for the past several years. The Society has also been active in producing its own special music events and/or workshops, which are held every other year, to highlight various artists and folk music themes. For example, the Society held all day events to pay tribute to the music of Woody Guthrie, Jimmie Rodgers and the original Carter Familty; we hosted several day concerts for local musicians; we sponsored regional performances for singer/songwriter members of Just Plain Folks, a national organization of songwriters; we joined up with Northampton Community College's Theatre Arts Dept. to perform the music score live for their Grapes of Wrath play, and we even teamed with the Lehigh Valley Storyteller's Guild to put on a free concert for children.

Our Performing Group: Our performing group currently has six musicians who play regularly for public, private and institutional functions for people of all ages. Our performances are tailored to the age of the group and/or to the event and we are particularly fond of playing for senior citizen groups, families, children, and festivals. We encourage sing-a-longs at our performances and occasionally have song books available for audience use. Included in the performance is often a brief history, origin and evolution of the folk song selections. Our group's play-out music repertoire of approximately 300 songs consists of American-born folk songs from 19th and 20th Century early America, the folk revival period of the 1960s, contemporary folk music, songs from Appalachia, bluegrass, classic country, Tin Pan Alley, Christmas music, Woody Guthrie, Kingston Trio, Carter family, old gospel, originals and songs for children. The group is strictly acoustic with the exception of electric bass and miked sound reinforcement where needed. Our instrumentation consists of: Autoharp, mandolin, 6 and 12 string guitar, resonator guitar (Dobro), fiddle, 5-string bluegrass banjo, tenor banjo, open-back banjo, octave mandolin, ukelele, recorder, Weissenborn guitar, harmonica, mandolin, mountain and hammer dulcimer, bass guitar and a variety of interesting percussion instruments including djembe and doumbek drums, washboard, tambourine, spoons, shakers, chimes and castanets. Our performing group works diligently to blend vocal harmonies and vary instrumentation for each song they perform.

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